Argentina - Carlos Pellegrini & Esteros Del Ibera

Four hours on a converted school bus on a unpaved road, we arrived in the town of Carlos Pellegrini. The bus driver dropped us off here (um...Senor driver, donde esta the town?):
We took a boat tour of Esteros Del Ibera, a swamp area. Bill doing safety check:

We saw about fifty crocodiles:

This is a carpincho:
Marsh deer:
Even though we did not have our own bathroom at the hotel, we really liked it because we met nice, interesting Argentineans that spoke English there. We cannot get beyond ´hello, we are from California, we love your county´ in our Spanish conversations, and it was great being able to talk to the locals. We met a musician who plays double bass in a philharmonic, an art student and surfer, an English teacher and a biology student:Bill had to stop this pony from trying to get into our room:

To get to the next town, we rode in this four-wheel drive, converted truck on a dirt road:

I have been obsessed with seeing a real Argentinean gaucho (traditional cowboy) ever since we got to Argentina, which has not been too successful since gauchos are going extinct. Needless to say, I was very happy when our converted truck picked up three hitchhiking gauchos. One of them dropped what looked like a nail, so I picked it up for him - it was a bullet! How gaucho is that! We did not take any picture of them (we try to avoid annoying men with bullets), but here is a picture of another gaucho:

Gauchos?:

Argentina - Gualeguaychu, Concordia & Mercedes

We finally left Buenos Aires and are busing it up north to Iguazu Falls. It takes about twenty-five hours by bus, so we are stopping at towns on the way to break up the ride. Of the two ways to get there, we are taking the less travelled, more rural route because there are hot springs on the way.


Bill loves hot springs. I discovered just how much in 2000 when he took me on a trip to British Columbia, Canada, to ´find´ natural, undeveloped hot springs. This process involved off-road driving, hiking and sightings of naked, middle-aged hippie people; and as a result, we broke up twice on that trip.


Fortunately, the hot springs we visited this time in Gualeguaychu and Concordia were developed and people wore clothes.



We are currently in Mercedes. We are sort of stuck in this town tonight as we couldn´t make the connecting bus we wanted to catch in time. This town is not on the Lonely Planet and the tourist office was closed, so we ended up following a little kid tout to a hostel.


Bill at Mercedes bus station:Downtown Mercedes:

Argentina - Buenos Aires (Again)

We are back in Buenos Aires, again crashing with Jeremy. He will never be able to get rid of us now that we have gotten used to the good life:

We went to a dinner & tango show for $80 per person, so technically, we should be starving for the next two days under our budget plan. But it was worth every penny! I have never had so much fun at a show since "Thunder From Down Under" in Vegas. The three glasses of champagne that I had probably helped (it was open bar).

Here is a video clip of the tango dancers:

I found a Korean restaurant nearby "our" hotel, but it was closed. Here's me being upset that it's closed and Bill calming me down:

So we took a half an hour cab to a suburb where Koreatown is located. I walked into the first Korean store I saw and asked for restaurant recommendations. At first, I was a bit doubtful about the recommended restaurant as it looked slightly like a hospital room with curtained dividers, but the food was great! We got twenty different side dishes:

Afterwards, we went to the race track, where Bill won $100! It was amazing because Bill never wins, not even those scratch cards.

Here's Bill and Jeremy at the race track:

Ladies, Jeremy is single.

Uruguay - Punta Del Este

Punta Del Este is where the young, hip and wealthy South Americans go in the summer for the beaches and partying. But right now, it being the winter, it attracted more old people and families taking advantage of the off season rates - which is more our style anyway.
We rented a scooter and drove around the peninsula. It was fun, but very windy and cold.

Bill on the scooter - his helmet didn't fit:

Video clip of me driving the scooter in an empty parking lot - wheeeeeeeee!:

Typical items on the menu in restaurants in Uruguay are steak, burger, pizza, pasta and hot dog. We have been starting every meal with a 70 cent hot dog as an appetizer. I tried to eat healthy once and ordered ensalada russo (Russian salad) and got potato salad with mayo. I think we have scurvy.

Attempt at healthy eating - seafood soup:

Giant hands:

Uruguay - Montevideo

According to the Lonely Planet, Montevideo, the capital city of Uruguay, is a pretty mellow city by South American standards. It is just our luck that we arrived there on Constitution Day, a national holiday. The city, at least the downtown portion where we were, was eerily dead - everything was closed and there weren´t many people around.

We expertly navigated ourselves right into the slum area. We probably should have turned around when a crazy and/or high lady asked us for a cigarette, but we stubbornly kept on going and ended up being followed by some sketchy guy for a block.

We decided it was probably a good night to have an early dinner and watch TV in our hotel room. When Bill went out to the balcony of our room to smoke, he saw a guy break a shop window and run off with something. The police came later and the store alarm went off all night. We are feeling very much like hardcore backpackers.

This is the view from our balcony. It´s the store next to the parked car on the left that was broken into (it was a fur coat shop):

To its credit, Montevideo looked very nice the next morning when there were actually people in it, but our hearts were not in it anymore.

Chivito - steak burger with boiled eggs, ham, cheese, olives, lettuce and tomato:

Horse buggy waiting for the green light - I said ¨how cute!¨ and took a picture, but later felt bad when I realized that they were going through trash containers around the city, looking for food and other stuff:
Finally! We had heard so much about this mate (tea) drinking craze in South America (where everyone goes around with their own mate cup, straw and thermos), but did not see any in Buenos Aires. We had about twenty sightings in Uruguay. Here is one:

Uruguay - Colonia del Sacramento

One hour boat ride from Buenos Aires, we arrived in Colonia, a historical port town in Uruguay. An Argentine guy we met in Buenos Aires jokingly told us that Uruguay is like a suburb of Buenos Aires. I don´t think we should repeat that joke here.

Thanks to immaculate research and planning, we are spending July and August in South America, in the dead of its winter. By the time we get to Europe in September, we will have missed Europe´s sunny summer season. I blame Bill.

Bill looking very cold:
Colonia is very cute, with 17th century buildings and cobble stone streets. That being said, sometimes I miss the ´old lady in traditional dress almost sitting on Bill´s lap in a crowded mini-van with live chicken in the trunk´ type experience of Central and northern South America.

Argentina - Buenos Aires

We had planned to travel more in the southern part of Bolivia, but there were multiple road blocks due to political demonstrations. It was probably nothing, but we didn´t want to walk into a potential hassle and Lorena found us cheap tickets to Buenos Aires, so we flew here instead.

The night we arrived in Buenos Aires, it snowed. The last snow in Buenos Aires was in 1918! There were tons of people in the street taking pictures. Here´s a Time article about it. With these odds, I am going to buy a lottery ticket.

Bill´s cousin Jeremy is in Buenos Aires for business. So we are crashing at his five star hotel room. The international freeloading continues. Thanks, Jeremy!

So, what have we been doing in Buenos Aires for a week?:

(That´s Jeremy above.)

We are eating about one cow a day. For $10, you can get an amazing meal here, though we always pay more because Bill refuses to get the cheap house wine. Portenos (people from Buenos Aires) eat LATE! Restaurants don`t even open until 8 or 9pm. We have seen families with little kids just sitting down to eat at 11pm. Here`s Bill showing the time (11:45pm) at a restaurant:

This is at Recoleta. It feels like the Upper West side in NYC with cute restaurants, shops and doorman buildings:

Recoleta cemetery - the size of a small town. Evita (played by Madonna in the movie, angering many Portenos) is buried here:

Subway made it easier to find our way around the city:

La Bocca - a working class neighborhood famous for its brightly painted buildings:

This road has about 16 lanes:

Bonus Item:

(Buenos Aires has one of the largest Jewish population outside Israel.)

Bolivia - Santa Cruz

We visited my friend Lorena in Santa Cruz. Lorena and I went to junior high school together in Kingston, Jamaica. We were both fourteen when I saw her last and now she is a mother of two! Lorena and her family graciously hosted us for five days. Thanks, Lorena! Call us the international freeloaders.

With Lorena at her parents´ beautiful house where we stayed:

Lorena`s youngest sister, Eliana, is dating a model, Junior. That´s him with the abs below:

Bill and the model:

At Lorena´s uncle´s lake resort, with her son, David:

At Lorena`s grandparents`:

Lunch! Majadito - rice with shredded beef jerky, eggs and plantains. That potato looking thing is yuca:

Bonus Item 1 - Jeeheon´s hot moves in 1991 (yes, I had big hair then.):

Bonus Item 2 - Video clip of Bill bowling (...badly):



(With us in the video are: Lorena, her husband Alvaro, Eliana, Junior, Lorena´s sister Vanesa and her boyfriend Mauricio)